A Hot Bowl of Spicy Lentil Soup with Buttered Bread

It’s time have a cup of tea. It’s time to play with the cat until he scratches you. It’s time to sit on the couch and stare at the wall a bit. It’s time to stand in the kitchen and eat Ritz crackers and chug orange juice.

It’s time to make a giant pot of soup… and sorta use a recipe… but not really use a recipe.

in a large saucepan over medium heat, warm olive oil. Add the uncased chicken sausage and cook, breaking up with a spatula as it cooks. Sausage should finish cooking in small chunks. Remove from the pan.

Add a touch more olive oil if necessary. Add onions, celery, and carrots. Cook until the onions are transluscent, about 5 to seven minutes. Stir occasionally. Add the garlic, cumin, and chili flakes, and cook for one minute more.

Add the sausage back to the pan. Stir to incorporate. Add the lentils and chicken stock. Reduce the heat to low and simmer the soup, uncovered, until the lentils are tender, about 45 minutes.

Serve soup with a generous sprinkling of parmesan cheese, a drizzle of olive oil, and good crusty bread. Soup will last, in an airtight container in the fridge, for up to 5 days. Soup also freezes well.

Oh Joy, I love you. And I have a new-found love for lentils.
To cut costs and go easier on all our bodies I’ve started doing at least one meatless meal a week. Lentils have been well-received {and that by 3 grown men! shocking!}.
Now if only I could find good sausage here in Kampala….

Hi, Joy, thanks a lot for your posts, they´re just awesome!! Here in Spain Lentil soup is a traditional meal that takes very common in every home, but we do not add chicken, we add a “chorizo” (spicy sausage). Love your cinnamon rolls recipe!!

I know what you mean, I call this time of year ‘crackers’, where I come home all burnt out and can’t think about anything and just stand in the kitchen eating crackers straight from the box. If I don’t have something healthy to grab and reheat quickly, crackers is all I’ll eat. Lucky for me, I just made a huge pot of spicy lentil and kale soup to use up a truckload of kale I had sitting in my fridge. So hearty and good!